TUESDAY POETRY CHALLENGE...9-21-10

[Mlou]

Hi, guys! Looks like this may be my last post as challenger here. We seem to be the last of the Mohicans. No input from the powers that be, or whatever, so....anyway, a day early but here.

1. A list of words from which to write a poem of your choice of style...

memoir, pastel, counted, lyric, starlet, samovar, evening, imagine, sting, bar

2. Write 2 quartrains, whose thoughts/themes are opposed.

3. A poem about being somewhere that is alien to you.

[Mlou]

Well, looks like this one's a bust. Obviously, will let it ride another week.

[LilacWine]

For some reason (insanity, perhaps) the first thing I thought of when I saw prompt three was "I dreamed I was .... in my Maidenform bra".

[Mlou]

heehee...Since I lost one headlight, I don't even wear a bra any more.

[Mlou]

(word list)

BREW OF MEMORIES

In the evening of my life I counted
purple sorrows and pastel joys, my memoir
lifting the bar of yesterday's door,
revealing a string of lyrical moments,
remembered or imagined,
with the poignant beauty of a
tarnished samovar, arranged on a scarlet shawl
still steaming gently with the warmth
of a fading day.

[LilacWine]

nicely done, gentle and nostalgic.

[Mlou]

Well, I'm just going to let this sit here. The challenges haven't had a fair shot yet.

[funkywriter3]

My playful try at number three.
Anti-Poetry

I’ve always wanted to have a way with words
similar to the intercourse between nerds.
Where looks are set aside
and true love resides.
I admit my first crush was Ezra Pound
unfortunately, as demonstrated above, I can’t say anything
that would be deemed profound.
I really can’t rhyme
I just don’t have the time
to be a bestseller writer
is contrary to my personality for I find it difficult to pull all-nighters.
Did I mention I’m anti-poetry?
Let the words roll off the tongue like some melodic sensuality
by a man full of passionate desire and
let the lady lick her bright red lips enticing the man of spoken word.
Words aren’t a land of milk and honey
(perhaps a colony of killer bees)
bs is what makes the real money
(please deposit the necessary fees).
Lovey dovey let her swoon over your immaculate desires
crime on the streets is a stale piece of bread--
overused motifs sell the best.
(they hold some grain of truth)
My competitors say I should just take a rest
(I’m still in the prime of youth)
perhaps I will set fame and fortune atop a fire
kindle it with a crisp green bill.
Build a nest with my words and
make my readers trek up a wee little rocky mountain hill.
Of course you are now convinced
that my writing is worth reading for
I have delivered a flawless sales pitch
and now I will become filthy rich.
All because I’m anti-poetry.
What a marvelous thing so
I jump and skip while I sing
maybe I will don a crown like some royal king
or wear a gaudy ring?
I see you staring
at this page trying to gain some prophetic wisdom
but I cackle at your naivete.
I have already poisoned the well and told you I’m anti-poetry
and you dare ask why?
Well let me explain that to you
in words you will not know because they are disguised.
In images that allude to some elaborate metaphor:
ink dripping and sloshing over the baby blue lines
staining the tips
of iridescent pupils.
shadows aligned with an infantile darkness stare
across the aisle of perpetually ancient dissent.
Translate that for me
I am self proclaimed anti-poetry
because I cannot even articulate
what this poem means to me
and if the poet cannot explain her own poetry
she might as well make others spit on her poetry
and yell from the rooftops " I AM ANTI-POETRY!"

[Mlou]

Well, quite a contradiction between statement and truth here! If you were really anti, you wouldn't be writing it so well...Very long write, so I'm glad you drew a deep breath before the shout at the end. Very well accomplished.
And how are things going for you these days??

[funkywriter3]

Thank you Mlou. To me being anti-poetry is alien so I thought it would be appropriate for this challenge. I sat down with my best friend by the bell tower today and we read poetry to calm down. Our professor thought it was hilarious we used poetry to calm down.
I am excellent, how are you?

[Mlou]

Hi, funky...sent you a PM...

[Olsenpotter]

<b>High School Drama</b>

"You're cute, you're funny even, but no."

Cute: It's a killing joke.

"Maybe, if no one else asks me."

No Senior Prom for me.

As my mother says:
"Girls don't make passes
at boys in thick glasses."

So when She, (capital S),
said, "you're kind of cute."

I took it to mean
She liked me.
Liked: no sexual tension between us.

Now we're married
and the idea of her loving me
is alien to me.

It's otherworldly.

I get drunk off the joy I feel
when I look her;

I get high when the phone rings
and they ask for Mrs. Potter.

And I realize
high school was the alien planet;
inside Her kiss, I've finally come home.

[Mlou]

This is great, OP! The agonies and the ecstasies of hight school could sometimes scar for life, and yet they were a passing phase you can look back on almost in
disbelief. ... This poem really expresses the joy there is in finding "the right one".

[mae]

Olsen, my dear, I almost swooned at your last line!

You know, my perspective on the high school dating scene was from the other side - the "I wonder if he'll ask me to the prom" side. It was interesting to see "Maybe, if no one else asks me." and to see the kiss of death "cute" applied. It's a wonder anyone survives high school!

As a critique, I felt that your transition from gawky high schooler with no date to a man loved by a woman was a little too gentle or quiet. I didn't get the "otherworldly" feel you talk about until a stanza or two later. Your two stanzas about getting drunk and getting high were great. It was the lead in to them that I felt was a bit too subtle. Now if that's what you intended, then that's great. I kind of wanted something stronger when I read it.

But that was only two stanzas out of a whole great poem. A great poem with a positively wonderful ending.

mae

[mae]

Well, hi, folks! I saw this pop up and felt like giving it a go. Here's a poem from the word list.

Kiss and Tell

I will write my memoir
someday
in purple prose
and other pastel words.
I will tell of times that counted
and people who didn't
when I write the lyric
of my life.

I will be a starlet
someday
though youth and promise
have flown.
I will be exotic, sipping tea
with a Russian prince.
Tea poured from a samovar
and made in the evening
of my life.

Is it sad to live a life
of imaginings?
And then to wake to reality
when it's almost done?
Only to feel the sting
of age.
Or do we lift a glass in tribute
for all the things
our hearts have seen and done?
Someday I'll write my memoir.
For now, a round for the bar!


mae

[TheMudge]

I like it. Third stanza doesn't seem to flow as well, to me...like what it says but it feels a little clunky. But I love the line "when I write the lyric of my life." There's a song in there somewhere.

[mae]

Ya know, Mudge, as I read it again, that last stanza doesn't really fit with the rest of it, anyway. In need of a rewrite, it seems. Thanks for reading.

mae

[TheMudge]

Well, I think the THOUGHT fits ... but the FORM isn't quite there yet ...

[TheMudge]

Well, I think the THOUGHT fits ... but the FORM isn't quite there yet ...

[funkywriter3]

Word List

Public Esteem

Tea boiled hair
descends down her samovar back
her eyes sting from tear stained glass light.
Yesterday, this evening starlet
imagined her vodka memoir
as she counted the number of
times she stirred the olive
around in the pastel glass.
Her lyric life slid beers
down the maple wood bar
shined with a coat of beeswax
and his beer foamed teeth
blew her a kiss.

[LilacWine]

Lovely poem, Funky. Nice to see you still posting.

[Mlou]

Mae and Funky...I missed your poems when you posted!
Mae...I really like yours! I think it fall of a bit with "a round at the bar" ..not as elegant as the rest of the poem. Som lovely lyrical bittersweet lines there.

Funky..nice characterization...tea-boiled hair is descriptive indeed, also the beer-foamed teeth (you need hyphens )